UNITED NATIONS, Mar 11 (TNS):The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Michelle Bachelet, has underscored the need to empower Afghan women, saying they should be at heart of peacebuilding, humanitarian and development processes if Afghanistan is to find peace and progress.<\/p>\n
Speaking from Kabul, where she is listening to women \u2014 and talking to the Taliban authorities about the urgent, critical need to bring an end to the serious human rights violations that women and girls face \u2014 Ms. Bachelet said Afghan women have been threatened and attacked for speaking up, and excluded from positions of power.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut this has not stopped them from advocating courageously for their rights and creating networks of support,\u201d she said. \u201cThey are not passive bystanders.\u201d\u009d<\/p>\n
Indeed, in the face of war, extreme poverty and unspeakable violence, she said Afghan women have been working tirelessly to protect and provide for their families and communities.<\/p>\n
The High Commissioner for Human Rights stressed that girls should be able to go to school and university, and empowered to contribute robustly to the future of their country.<\/p>\n
Women should be visibly represented in the police force, courts of law, Government and the private sector \u2013 indeed in every sphere of civic and public life.<\/p>\n
Moreover, Afghan women have the equal right to demonstrate peacefully without fear of reprisal, to speak openly about the problems in society and to have a meaningful seat at the table, to craft solutions that respond to their realities and demands, she said.<\/p>\n
Having served as President, Minister for Defence and Minister for Health in Chile, her home country, she said she speaks from experience in understanding that sustainable peace, economic development and realization of the rights to health care, education, justice \u201cand more\u201d requires the inclusion of women and girls.<\/p>\n
In celebration of International Women\u2019s Day, observed on 8 March, \u201cI stand with women all around the world,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I stand with the women and girls of Afghanistan, today and every day.\u201d\u009d<\/p>\n
Earlier in the week, Deborah Lyons, the Secretary-General\u2019s Special Representative for Afghanistan and Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) emphasized on March 8 that women\u2019s denial of rights to free movement, work, participation in public life and education, is limiting greater economic development for the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cMore needs to be done to promote equality of opportunity for women and girls in all areas of their lives,\u201d she stressed, a point similarly echoed by Mariam Safi, who \u2013 addressing the Security Council on 2 March \u2013 noted the rapid deterioration of women\u2019s rights since the Taliban seized power, in August 2021. \u201cRepression of women\u2019s rights appears central to the Taliban\u2019s vision for Afghanistan.\u201d\u009d<\/p>\n
Peacebuilding in Afghanistan has been intrusive, externally driven, top-down and technocratic for two decades, as powerful countries exploited the process for their own ends, Ms. Lyons said.<\/p>\n
Given those conditions, UNAMA must have an explicit mandate to support the full, safe, equal and meaningful participation of women across all processes, she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 11 (TNS):The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Michelle Bachelet, has underscored the need to empower Afghan women, saying they should be at heart of peacebuilding, humanitarian and development processes if Afghanistan is to find peace and progress. Speaking from Kabul, where she is listening to women \u2014 and talking to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":104331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,952],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-104330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world","category-united-nations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=104330"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104330\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104332,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104330\/revisions\/104332"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/104331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=104330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=104330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tns.world\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=104330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}